So, facebook is rewriting some organisational documents, and has asked for comment. The vast bulk of comment has focussed on right/responsibility 2.3, which you will be unsurprised to hear is about usage rights of digital media.
However, it’s an interesting and not-too convoluted read. I encourage the two people reading this blog to go and take a look. My own comments on the rights/responsibilities document follow…
Okay, not going to buy another Dell laptop. There’s just too many problems with the charger and battery - Last laptop, the charger went, then the replacement went. This time it might be the battery, rather than the charger - not sure (both my new laptop’s charger, and the bodgy repair of last laptop’s second charger, might have failed at around the same time), but it’s currently sitting at 13% - power on, not charging.
What kills me is that in each of these three catastrophic failures, there has been no problem with the transformer, nor any problem with the battery. The thing that’s died each time has been Dell’s infuriating power management system, which is built into both battery and transformer. I suppose it’s ostensibly there to stop you overcharging your battery or something - but if other laptop brands let you use a standard transformer, why do Dell have to do it different?
It smacks of planned obsolescence to me - but hopefully not planned well enough in this case - I reckon I might just squeak in under warranty, assuming I’ve kept all the paperwork (which is a rather big assumption, knowing me).
Came across a list of unfortunate domain names, which are so good I think they bear repeating (and with the exception of Pen Island, which doesn’t entirely convince me, they seem to be real - at least at a cursory glance):
How about some australian native plants from Mole Station Nursery? www.molestationnursery.com (Now at molerivernursery.com, even though they’re still called Mole Station. And these guys are definitely real - Colin has sold plants to them!)
Wanting a therapist in your area? No worries - use the Therapist Finder: www.therapistfinder.com
And finally, the one stop shop for all your pen-related needs: Pen Island - www.penisland.net
So, I managed to survive the back-to-back Friday 13th / Valentine’s Day terrors by locking myself indoors with a supply of tea and scotch finger biscuits, and getting better acquainted with the Flex API by kicking off Project Lazy once more.
Project Lazy is a platform game framework, which I’m hoping will someday develop into what has been described as a Massively Single-player environment. I’m planning on posting all the AS source files somewhere online sometime soon. At the moment, it’s all really just experimentation - getting used to the API. At the moment, I’m trying to sort out collision detection, which is always a problem, of course.
So you’ve installed Ubuntu, and you’re pretty damn happy about it. It’s still all a bit weird and new, but you’re amazed at how fast it runs, how flexible it is, and just how fucking beautiful the world looks when the light from the setting sun streams through your window just so, and isn’t it amazing that people would be willing to invest so much time in order to give you something so wonderful, for free.
One very important thing to remember is this: Don’t be a Dick about it.
Okay, so a few posts ago, I created a makefile that compiles a .as file into a .swf, then launches it in a browser. Only problem is, I have to call that from the terminal, which is a bit tedious. I’m working on one particular flex project for a while, so I decided to make it work for me more easily. Here’s where Ubuntu comes into its own - sometimes it can be hard to work out how things are done, but you can really get your machine running exactly the way you want it.
Well, I’m about done, really. Just going to install some apps. Here are 3 of my favourites.
Eclipse: A great multi-purpose programming platform. Install it from the Add/Remove tool, or manually for the latest version.
Battle for Wesnoth: An awesome turn-based strategy with a fantasy theme and playable campaigns.
Blender: A 3d modelling program. WARNING: This program appears to have a seriously fucked up user interface when you first use it (I couldn’t even figure out how to close it - had to hard-shutdown my computer). But if you put in the effort to learn it (there are websites out there to help) it quite quickly burns itself into your neural pathways until it becomes intuitive, to the point where you find yourself trying to use its features in other programs.
Thankyou, Adobe, for going Open Source with swf! Now, it took me a while to find out how to get the flex compiler working in Ubuntu, but it’s pretty easy when it comes down to it.
